+ At the heart of
beauty is the union of spirit and matter. Spirit: the ineffable, ungraspable
quality that brings something alive. Beauty: a unity beyond rational
apprehension, a whole greater than the sum of its parts, a lens or a window
that offers a glimpse of a greater dimension of reality, one that brings us
closer to the source of being.

+ Blessed be you,
mighty matter, irresistible march of evolution, reality ever newborn; you who,
by constantly shattering our mental categories, force us to go ever further and
further in our pursuit of the truth.

+ Each element of
the cosmos is woven positively from all the others. It is impossible to cut
into this network, to isolate a piece of it, without all of its borders fraying
and coming undone. The universe holds together by the whole of itself, and the
only one possible way to consider it... is to take it as a whole.

+ Perhaps no one has contributed to our understanding of
how spirit and matter are beautifully connected than Pierre
Teilhard de Chardin. Evolution
itself is such a beautiful thing. You
only have to consider yourself. How
wonderful, how beautiful, you are and so is every other person, every other
creature, every cell, every atom, every quark everywhere.